1 00:00:02,520 --> 00:00:13,320 Speaker 1: Bloomberg Audio Studios, Podcasts, Radio News. 2 00:00:17,760 --> 00:00:21,040 Speaker 2: Hello and welcome to another episode of the Odd Lots podcast. 3 00:00:21,120 --> 00:00:23,360 Speaker 3: I'm Joe Wisenthal and I'm Tracy Alloway. 4 00:00:23,440 --> 00:00:25,919 Speaker 2: Tracy, have you noticed there were some crazy moves in 5 00:00:25,960 --> 00:00:26,680 Speaker 2: the market lately. 6 00:00:26,880 --> 00:00:29,360 Speaker 3: I know, it's kind of funny if you look at 7 00:00:29,440 --> 00:00:33,640 Speaker 3: I guess traditional measures of overall volatility in the market. 8 00:00:33,760 --> 00:00:37,560 Speaker 3: So obviously things like the vis it was relatively low 9 00:00:38,000 --> 00:00:41,280 Speaker 3: up until recently, and that was despite all these big 10 00:00:41,400 --> 00:00:44,960 Speaker 3: surges in a bunch of stocks. So the megacap tech 11 00:00:45,000 --> 00:00:48,400 Speaker 3: companies kind of stand out there. So I guess overall 12 00:00:48,720 --> 00:00:51,920 Speaker 3: benchmark moves were kind of low. But if you look 13 00:00:52,000 --> 00:00:55,400 Speaker 3: within that, if you look at specific single stock performance, 14 00:00:55,960 --> 00:00:59,160 Speaker 3: things like dispersion, it's been kind of crazy, sort of 15 00:00:59,280 --> 00:01:01,360 Speaker 3: under the surf, there's been a lot going on. 16 00:01:01,720 --> 00:01:05,800 Speaker 2: We are recording this February fifteenth, twenty twenty four shares 17 00:01:05,800 --> 00:01:08,680 Speaker 2: of super Micro. I don't know what they do. I 18 00:01:08,720 --> 00:01:11,479 Speaker 2: know they do something with AI. They're currently at nine 19 00:01:11,520 --> 00:01:14,720 Speaker 2: to fifty one, up sixty nine dollars a share on 20 00:01:14,760 --> 00:01:18,000 Speaker 2: the day. On January eighteenth, they were at three hundred 21 00:01:18,000 --> 00:01:21,160 Speaker 2: and eleven, so it's a triple in a month. There 22 00:01:21,319 --> 00:01:24,399 Speaker 2: was some armholdings recently, which is like now in one 23 00:01:24,480 --> 00:01:26,600 Speaker 2: hundred and fifty billion. I mean, these are like serious 24 00:01:26,680 --> 00:01:29,040 Speaker 2: high market cap companies I do. 25 00:01:29,319 --> 00:01:31,040 Speaker 3: They're call these upcrashes. 26 00:01:31,200 --> 00:01:33,560 Speaker 2: Up crashes, that's the word that I use. So it's 27 00:01:33,600 --> 00:01:35,680 Speaker 2: something like, here's just a company that's been around for 28 00:01:35,720 --> 00:01:39,319 Speaker 2: a while, mature people understand it. It was a sixty 29 00:01:39,319 --> 00:01:42,000 Speaker 2: five billion dollar company a couple of weeks ago, it's 30 00:01:42,080 --> 00:01:44,760 Speaker 2: currently one hundred and twenty eight billion dollar company. Just 31 00:01:44,800 --> 00:01:49,040 Speaker 2: these big fat, chunky moves in both directions that we're saying. 32 00:01:49,240 --> 00:01:51,880 Speaker 3: Yeah, And on the one hand, obviously you can describe 33 00:01:51,880 --> 00:01:55,280 Speaker 3: it all to investors are getting really excited about things 34 00:01:55,320 --> 00:01:58,200 Speaker 3: like AI and again a lot of the movement we've 35 00:01:58,200 --> 00:02:00,640 Speaker 3: seen happen in tech stocks. But on the other hand, 36 00:02:00,760 --> 00:02:04,920 Speaker 3: it feels like there might be something else going on here. 37 00:02:05,000 --> 00:02:08,000 Speaker 3: And every once in a while I hear people talking 38 00:02:08,040 --> 00:02:12,560 Speaker 3: about multi strategy funds and the impact that those might 39 00:02:12,600 --> 00:02:14,959 Speaker 3: be having on these overall market moves. 40 00:02:15,400 --> 00:02:18,240 Speaker 2: Totally like these sort of moves that just keep going 41 00:02:18,240 --> 00:02:22,799 Speaker 2: in one direction over and over again. Speaking of multi 42 00:02:22,800 --> 00:02:25,320 Speaker 2: strategy hedge funds, which we're going to get into and 43 00:02:25,400 --> 00:02:28,560 Speaker 2: understand how they work and maybe if they are sort 44 00:02:28,600 --> 00:02:32,120 Speaker 2: of like changing the complexion of house docks trade these days. 45 00:02:32,400 --> 00:02:34,400 Speaker 2: I think there's been a lot of launches of them, 46 00:02:34,480 --> 00:02:36,840 Speaker 2: so we know that some of them have done really well, 47 00:02:36,880 --> 00:02:40,079 Speaker 2: and of course we've regaled with the incredible returns a Citadel. 48 00:02:40,320 --> 00:02:41,519 Speaker 2: But I think we're starting to see a lot of 49 00:02:41,560 --> 00:02:44,160 Speaker 2: people who were at those shops launch their own multi 50 00:02:44,160 --> 00:02:47,520 Speaker 2: strategy shops. So there was a good article too on 51 00:02:47,560 --> 00:02:51,400 Speaker 2: Bloomberg just this week talk about like, not only are 52 00:02:51,400 --> 00:02:54,280 Speaker 2: they proliferating, but for years they talked about how the 53 00:02:54,280 --> 00:02:56,960 Speaker 2: two and twenty model was fading. Like you and I 54 00:02:56,960 --> 00:03:00,000 Speaker 2: have probably heard that our whole career, it's going away 55 00:03:00,080 --> 00:03:01,960 Speaker 2: because they're making they're taking in more than that, and 56 00:03:02,000 --> 00:03:04,120 Speaker 2: I think they're like keeping like half the profits that 57 00:03:04,160 --> 00:03:06,800 Speaker 2: they make, so like twenty percent to sort of old 58 00:03:06,800 --> 00:03:09,480 Speaker 2: hat like, so these are huge money making machines. 59 00:03:09,520 --> 00:03:11,720 Speaker 3: Now is this is this pod Lots? 60 00:03:11,960 --> 00:03:13,000 Speaker 4: I think it's pod Lots. 61 00:03:13,080 --> 00:03:14,680 Speaker 2: This is the original pod Lot. 62 00:03:15,040 --> 00:03:17,519 Speaker 3: So there's only three things I really know about multi 63 00:03:17,520 --> 00:03:21,360 Speaker 3: strategy shops, which is like one, they're very hot right now, 64 00:03:21,440 --> 00:03:22,959 Speaker 3: and as you say, we have seen a lot of 65 00:03:23,040 --> 00:03:26,720 Speaker 3: launches recently. Two, I think they trade a lot, like 66 00:03:26,960 --> 00:03:29,280 Speaker 3: just in terms of absolute volume. I think they're very 67 00:03:29,280 --> 00:03:32,920 Speaker 3: active and becoming increasingly active in a bigger portion of 68 00:03:32,919 --> 00:03:35,240 Speaker 3: the market. And then three, I hear a lot of 69 00:03:35,280 --> 00:03:40,320 Speaker 3: talk about measuring performance scientifically and like the things they 70 00:03:40,400 --> 00:03:44,480 Speaker 3: do differently to maybe a traditional long short fund, but 71 00:03:44,560 --> 00:03:47,880 Speaker 3: I don't actually know what it means in detail. And 72 00:03:47,920 --> 00:03:51,360 Speaker 3: then also, as you were saying, I don't actually understand 73 00:03:51,400 --> 00:03:53,840 Speaker 3: completely the market impact. I think there are a lot 74 00:03:53,840 --> 00:03:56,440 Speaker 3: of different theories at the moment of how they might 75 00:03:56,520 --> 00:04:00,200 Speaker 3: be impacting the market. So I'm very excited about this conversation. 76 00:04:00,440 --> 00:04:03,800 Speaker 2: Yeah, tons of questions on a big and growing topic 77 00:04:03,880 --> 00:04:06,840 Speaker 2: that we should talk about more. So I'm excited. We 78 00:04:06,880 --> 00:04:08,360 Speaker 2: have the perfect guests. We're going to be speaking with 79 00:04:08,440 --> 00:04:11,520 Speaker 2: Krishna Kumar. He is the founder of goose Hollow Capital. 80 00:04:11,800 --> 00:04:15,680 Speaker 2: He previously ran pod capital at the Multi Strat Hedge 81 00:04:15,680 --> 00:04:18,839 Speaker 2: Fund MKP. He was also previously at Omega, and he 82 00:04:18,920 --> 00:04:21,479 Speaker 2: is going to talk about how these places work and 83 00:04:21,560 --> 00:04:25,080 Speaker 2: the sort of impact they have on house dogs trade. So, Krishna, 84 00:04:25,080 --> 00:04:27,200 Speaker 2: thank you so much for coming on Oudlacks. 85 00:04:26,760 --> 00:04:29,159 Speaker 4: Hey excited to be here, A big fan of the show. 86 00:04:29,480 --> 00:04:31,880 Speaker 2: What does a pod shop? Let's just start there, because 87 00:04:31,880 --> 00:04:34,760 Speaker 2: I have some idea of like this big fund. This 88 00:04:34,880 --> 00:04:36,600 Speaker 2: is what I think in my head. You have a 89 00:04:36,640 --> 00:04:39,480 Speaker 2: big fund with a bunch of money, a bunch of teams. 90 00:04:39,920 --> 00:04:41,760 Speaker 2: Maybe you have like a handful of people on each 91 00:04:41,800 --> 00:04:45,800 Speaker 2: all working for themselves. The better the teams do, presumably 92 00:04:45,839 --> 00:04:49,200 Speaker 2: they get more money, more resources, more capital to trade. 93 00:04:49,480 --> 00:04:51,640 Speaker 2: If they do badly, they're on a short leash. They 94 00:04:51,640 --> 00:04:55,320 Speaker 2: can be fired quickly, and somehow they make a lot 95 00:04:55,360 --> 00:04:57,120 Speaker 2: of money with that. But that is probably like the 96 00:04:57,160 --> 00:04:59,120 Speaker 2: extent of what I actually understand about how they work. 97 00:04:59,160 --> 00:05:00,360 Speaker 2: What are they So. 98 00:05:00,279 --> 00:05:03,560 Speaker 4: If you think about most hedge funds that people talk about, 99 00:05:03,720 --> 00:05:06,760 Speaker 4: most of them are now multi strategy funds, and that 100 00:05:07,000 --> 00:05:09,840 Speaker 4: are made of a bunch of pots underneath. So if 101 00:05:09,839 --> 00:05:13,039 Speaker 4: you go back in time to the first hedge fund 102 00:05:13,120 --> 00:05:16,279 Speaker 4: that ever started, A W. Jones, I mean that was 103 00:05:16,640 --> 00:05:20,440 Speaker 4: in some sense a manager with all these underlying analysts 104 00:05:20,480 --> 00:05:23,360 Speaker 4: who are then picking up looking at radious sectors and 105 00:05:23,440 --> 00:05:27,520 Speaker 4: running strategies right. And the evolution to that today is 106 00:05:27,560 --> 00:05:31,200 Speaker 4: this monster called the multi strategy fund, and it's sort 107 00:05:31,240 --> 00:05:33,680 Speaker 4: of a platform. So if you think about our economy, 108 00:05:33,720 --> 00:05:36,839 Speaker 4: we're very good at creating platforms out of things. So 109 00:05:36,839 --> 00:05:40,120 Speaker 4: if you take Apple as a company, Apple is a 110 00:05:40,120 --> 00:05:43,440 Speaker 4: platform company. They don't actually produce anything. They come up 111 00:05:43,440 --> 00:05:45,640 Speaker 4: with ideas. They come up with this vision pro and 112 00:05:45,680 --> 00:05:48,960 Speaker 4: then they get a bunch of people overseas to make them, 113 00:05:49,240 --> 00:05:52,800 Speaker 4: and then they market it. So the similar kind of 114 00:05:53,200 --> 00:05:56,960 Speaker 4: concept in hedge fund space is this idea of multi 115 00:05:56,960 --> 00:06:01,560 Speaker 4: strategy platforms and parts of the units that are working 116 00:06:01,760 --> 00:06:02,800 Speaker 4: within that platform. 117 00:06:03,279 --> 00:06:06,560 Speaker 3: So you actually work in a multi strategy fund. At 118 00:06:06,600 --> 00:06:11,520 Speaker 3: one point, I believe I'm curious how that platform idea 119 00:06:12,000 --> 00:06:16,920 Speaker 3: drives the culture. But then also like, what exactly is 120 00:06:17,080 --> 00:06:21,120 Speaker 3: the competitive edge that a multi strategy fund or a 121 00:06:21,320 --> 00:06:25,400 Speaker 3: pod shop is offering here? Is it just we're able 122 00:06:25,480 --> 00:06:30,120 Speaker 3: to select the best managers of individual strategies and put 123 00:06:30,160 --> 00:06:33,600 Speaker 3: them together in one place, like what makes a successful 124 00:06:33,839 --> 00:06:35,320 Speaker 3: multi strategy fund? 125 00:06:35,600 --> 00:06:38,120 Speaker 4: So yeah, so this is again is a sort of 126 00:06:38,160 --> 00:06:40,640 Speaker 4: part of the evolution. So if you go back in time, 127 00:06:41,520 --> 00:06:44,760 Speaker 4: we used to have this construct of single manager hedge funds, 128 00:06:45,120 --> 00:06:49,040 Speaker 4: which in the nineties were fairly big, and then people 129 00:06:49,080 --> 00:06:52,359 Speaker 4: said they wanted to get the average hedge fund performance. 130 00:06:52,520 --> 00:06:54,919 Speaker 4: Just like people like to buy the index, they wanted 131 00:06:54,960 --> 00:06:58,440 Speaker 4: to buy the index of hedge funds, and there wasn't once, 132 00:06:58,520 --> 00:07:01,480 Speaker 4: so they created something called the fund funds, which just 133 00:07:01,560 --> 00:07:06,360 Speaker 4: added fees on fees, so essentially you had underlying Hetch funds, 134 00:07:06,440 --> 00:07:09,800 Speaker 4: and then there was a fund manager that selected these 135 00:07:09,840 --> 00:07:12,920 Speaker 4: hedge funds, and they did extremely well from two thousand 136 00:07:13,000 --> 00:07:15,960 Speaker 4: to two thousand and seven, and then in eight also 137 00:07:16,000 --> 00:07:19,120 Speaker 4: so bad things happened. But what we found out was 138 00:07:19,560 --> 00:07:22,760 Speaker 4: fund of funds, the earlier iteration of the multi strategy 139 00:07:22,760 --> 00:07:26,160 Speaker 4: fund had all the downside and less of the upside, 140 00:07:26,440 --> 00:07:29,400 Speaker 4: because what we had in eight was a lot of 141 00:07:29,440 --> 00:07:33,720 Speaker 4: the underlying managers did poorly and people just wanted to 142 00:07:33,800 --> 00:07:36,040 Speaker 4: get out of Hetch funds as a whole, and the 143 00:07:36,080 --> 00:07:39,040 Speaker 4: hedge funds started to get all these investors, and then 144 00:07:39,080 --> 00:07:42,760 Speaker 4: the fund of funds, which were one level removed from them, 145 00:07:43,120 --> 00:07:46,760 Speaker 4: also gated the underlying investors, right, So that created this 146 00:07:46,840 --> 00:07:50,320 Speaker 4: whole thing where fund of funds as a concept became 147 00:07:50,920 --> 00:07:54,480 Speaker 4: not a great idea. And so the next version of 148 00:07:54,520 --> 00:07:58,760 Speaker 4: that now is this multi strategy fund. Essentially, you want 149 00:07:58,800 --> 00:08:04,040 Speaker 4: to get in of different managers returns, and you don't 150 00:08:04,120 --> 00:08:07,000 Speaker 4: have the ability to do that yourself, so you go 151 00:08:07,040 --> 00:08:10,040 Speaker 4: to a multi strategy platform and you end up getting 152 00:08:10,520 --> 00:08:14,640 Speaker 4: a whole bunch of managers as a composite Oh see, So. 153 00:08:14,600 --> 00:08:18,320 Speaker 3: It's not necessarily outperformance, although there are a lot of 154 00:08:18,440 --> 00:08:21,800 Speaker 3: multi strategy funds out there that seem to be outperforming, 155 00:08:21,880 --> 00:08:24,160 Speaker 3: but more the diversification benefits. 156 00:08:24,640 --> 00:08:26,360 Speaker 4: Yeah, I think it is. I mean, if you think 157 00:08:26,400 --> 00:08:30,640 Speaker 4: about the average multi strategy fund, they have lots of 158 00:08:30,720 --> 00:08:33,679 Speaker 4: uncorrelated strategies, right, So they have, you know, a typical 159 00:08:33,720 --> 00:08:36,360 Speaker 4: multi strategy fund. The core of it, it's some sort 160 00:08:36,400 --> 00:08:40,080 Speaker 4: of quant strategy like a stat art strategy. Pretty much 161 00:08:40,080 --> 00:08:43,640 Speaker 4: every large multi strategy fund is built around that. And 162 00:08:43,720 --> 00:08:48,640 Speaker 4: then you have fixed income RV, credit RV, macro RV, 163 00:08:49,160 --> 00:08:51,880 Speaker 4: and then macro directional which is what I do, and 164 00:08:52,000 --> 00:08:56,120 Speaker 4: all of that is put together into a composite performance profile. 165 00:08:56,440 --> 00:08:59,680 Speaker 4: So given that all these strategies are sort of orthogonal, 166 00:09:00,080 --> 00:09:04,280 Speaker 4: over time, you tend to benefit from the lack of correlation. 167 00:09:04,960 --> 00:09:08,319 Speaker 4: And that's one of the biggest benefits that investors see 168 00:09:08,360 --> 00:09:10,960 Speaker 4: when they allocate to multi strategy funds. 169 00:09:11,640 --> 00:09:14,920 Speaker 2: So someone sets up the pod shop. Someone is the 170 00:09:15,200 --> 00:09:17,920 Speaker 2: you know, runs the whole platform so to speak, and 171 00:09:18,000 --> 00:09:21,200 Speaker 2: brings in fund managers and fires fund managers who are 172 00:09:21,200 --> 00:09:24,840 Speaker 2: doing these different strategies. What does that person have to 173 00:09:24,840 --> 00:09:27,280 Speaker 2: be good at for the platform to work. 174 00:09:27,600 --> 00:09:29,840 Speaker 4: Yeah, so if you think about platforms, so if you 175 00:09:29,840 --> 00:09:32,160 Speaker 4: think about Apple as a platform, Apple is good at 176 00:09:32,200 --> 00:09:35,600 Speaker 4: coming up with cool ideas and marketing it. So if 177 00:09:35,600 --> 00:09:38,800 Speaker 4: you take a multi strategy fund, the platform owners have 178 00:09:38,880 --> 00:09:41,679 Speaker 4: to be good at raising capital obviously because that's one 179 00:09:41,720 --> 00:09:44,000 Speaker 4: of the biggest things you need, and then you have 180 00:09:44,080 --> 00:09:47,600 Speaker 4: to be good at risk management and the operational infrastructure. 181 00:09:47,920 --> 00:09:52,080 Speaker 4: So what they're providing in a sense is providing all 182 00:09:52,200 --> 00:09:56,720 Speaker 4: the stuff that's not investment related to the underlying pods, 183 00:09:56,960 --> 00:10:00,520 Speaker 4: so the pots can go about doing their investing and 184 00:10:00,559 --> 00:10:03,440 Speaker 4: then the platform provides all the other services. 185 00:10:03,960 --> 00:10:07,240 Speaker 3: So talk to us about what multi strategy funds are 186 00:10:07,320 --> 00:10:11,920 Speaker 3: actually doing here, because I think about a traditional hedge fund, 187 00:10:12,160 --> 00:10:16,680 Speaker 3: maybe something like Pershing under Bill Ackman. There's a charismatic guy, 188 00:10:17,840 --> 00:10:20,079 Speaker 3: to put it one way, and he's making all these 189 00:10:20,120 --> 00:10:24,480 Speaker 3: big bets. He's going long or short certain companies. Multi 190 00:10:24,480 --> 00:10:27,400 Speaker 3: strategy funds. Obviously, the clue is in the name. They 191 00:10:27,440 --> 00:10:30,360 Speaker 3: have a bunch of different strategies, but typically what are 192 00:10:30,400 --> 00:10:32,280 Speaker 3: they doing on a daily basis? 193 00:10:33,040 --> 00:10:36,520 Speaker 4: So I think there's a couple of reasons why they 194 00:10:36,520 --> 00:10:39,840 Speaker 4: are in prominence, right, So the first and foremost one 195 00:10:40,800 --> 00:10:44,160 Speaker 4: is that of course, like you have, the regulatory burden 196 00:10:44,240 --> 00:10:46,959 Speaker 4: of a single manager hedge fund has gone up dramatically, 197 00:10:46,960 --> 00:10:48,920 Speaker 4: So if you are a single person and you want 198 00:10:48,920 --> 00:10:51,160 Speaker 4: to start a hedge fund, it's much more complicated now 199 00:10:51,200 --> 00:10:52,560 Speaker 4: than it was twenty years ago. 200 00:10:52,720 --> 00:10:55,440 Speaker 3: This is like the key man risk aspect of it. 201 00:10:55,440 --> 00:10:58,800 Speaker 4: Well, a key mand risk, but also the operational infrastructure 202 00:10:58,800 --> 00:11:02,280 Speaker 4: you need and the support and all the other regulatory 203 00:11:02,320 --> 00:11:05,680 Speaker 4: burdens that come with it is tremendous. So that's one 204 00:11:05,880 --> 00:11:09,280 Speaker 4: aspect of the thing multi strategy fund is solving. But 205 00:11:09,360 --> 00:11:13,280 Speaker 4: the other thing is the multi strategy fund is technically 206 00:11:13,320 --> 00:11:17,400 Speaker 4: looking for good managers and providing them a platform so 207 00:11:17,440 --> 00:11:20,560 Speaker 4: that they can actually run their business. And the multi 208 00:11:20,640 --> 00:11:24,760 Speaker 4: strategy fund, the fund holding company, then provides all the 209 00:11:24,840 --> 00:11:29,400 Speaker 4: other infrastructure needs like risk management, reporting, all of that 210 00:11:29,480 --> 00:11:33,320 Speaker 4: fun stuff. But if you think about why they have 211 00:11:33,520 --> 00:11:36,320 Speaker 4: done so well in the recent past, I mean, part 212 00:11:36,320 --> 00:11:38,280 Speaker 4: of it is just that, you know, we have this 213 00:11:38,600 --> 00:11:41,360 Speaker 4: like demand for leverage right in the system. So if 214 00:11:41,400 --> 00:11:44,959 Speaker 4: you think about like what we did in the global 215 00:11:45,040 --> 00:11:48,960 Speaker 4: financial crisis, obviously in my view, the fiscal response was 216 00:11:49,040 --> 00:11:51,640 Speaker 4: very timid, right, Like we spent about three percent of 217 00:11:51,679 --> 00:11:55,160 Speaker 4: GDP compared to COVID basically spent you know, ten percent 218 00:11:55,200 --> 00:11:58,280 Speaker 4: of GDP or more. So that meant that our recovery 219 00:11:58,360 --> 00:12:01,560 Speaker 4: was very, very timid. And there was this whole thing 220 00:12:01,679 --> 00:12:05,000 Speaker 4: with austerity, not just here but elsewhere too, which meant 221 00:12:05,000 --> 00:12:09,560 Speaker 4: that yields, real yields collapsed and the overall return you 222 00:12:09,559 --> 00:12:12,120 Speaker 4: could get on capital collapsed. So the only way for 223 00:12:12,280 --> 00:12:14,440 Speaker 4: you now to generate any sort of return was to 224 00:12:14,480 --> 00:12:17,120 Speaker 4: take a lot of leverage, and so hedge funds as 225 00:12:17,160 --> 00:12:20,680 Speaker 4: a whole are doing that. Like they provide you some 226 00:12:20,800 --> 00:12:24,360 Speaker 4: form of leverage in terms of access, but the multi 227 00:12:24,360 --> 00:12:28,559 Speaker 4: strategy funds take it to the next level where one 228 00:12:28,559 --> 00:12:32,280 Speaker 4: of the biggest problems with a single manager fund is 229 00:12:32,320 --> 00:12:35,600 Speaker 4: often that you may not have that many good ideas. Right. 230 00:12:35,679 --> 00:12:39,120 Speaker 4: So if I'm a macro guy, I'm probably lucky if 231 00:12:39,200 --> 00:12:42,360 Speaker 4: I find four good ideas in a year. Right. The 232 00:12:42,360 --> 00:12:44,319 Speaker 4: rest of the time, I don't know what to do. 233 00:12:44,520 --> 00:12:46,600 Speaker 4: You know, I have to keep busy. Now, if you're 234 00:12:46,600 --> 00:12:50,000 Speaker 4: an investor paying two and twenty in fees, you want 235 00:12:50,120 --> 00:12:53,319 Speaker 4: all the capital to be deployed at all times and 236 00:12:53,440 --> 00:12:56,520 Speaker 4: to be invested in all sorts of things. So one 237 00:12:56,559 --> 00:13:00,600 Speaker 4: of the problems the multi strategy fund solves is to 238 00:13:00,679 --> 00:13:04,400 Speaker 4: make sure that capital is always deployed, and they do 239 00:13:04,480 --> 00:13:06,920 Speaker 4: that by applying a lot of leverage. Right, So a 240 00:13:07,000 --> 00:13:10,079 Speaker 4: typical multi strategy fund, you know, you give them a dollar, 241 00:13:10,160 --> 00:13:13,040 Speaker 4: they have four or five dollars of exposure, and they 242 00:13:13,080 --> 00:13:17,600 Speaker 4: have multiple pods that are then essentially deploying a capital. 243 00:13:32,880 --> 00:13:37,200 Speaker 3: My impression post financial crisis was this idea that leverage 244 00:13:37,240 --> 00:13:40,720 Speaker 3: was supposed to get more expensive, and it definitely did, 245 00:13:40,840 --> 00:13:44,240 Speaker 3: I guess for regulated banks, and we saw, for instance, 246 00:13:44,440 --> 00:13:49,000 Speaker 3: the regulations on things like prop trading. I guess liquidity, coverage, 247 00:13:49,080 --> 00:13:52,200 Speaker 3: ratio is just everything that makes it more difficult for 248 00:13:52,320 --> 00:13:55,600 Speaker 3: banks to actually trade on behalf of their clients or 249 00:13:55,600 --> 00:13:59,439 Speaker 3: for their own books. So how are multi strategy firms 250 00:13:59,720 --> 00:14:02,000 Speaker 3: get the edge here on leverage? 251 00:14:02,480 --> 00:14:05,160 Speaker 4: So leverage is always expensive, I mean it was much 252 00:14:05,240 --> 00:14:08,480 Speaker 4: cheaper ten years ago when interest rates were close to 253 00:14:08,559 --> 00:14:11,600 Speaker 4: zero everywhere, so you could borrow infinite amounts of money. 254 00:14:11,640 --> 00:14:14,239 Speaker 4: And so if you think about the performance of these strategies, 255 00:14:14,280 --> 00:14:17,600 Speaker 4: they've been phenomenal in that period. We need two things 256 00:14:17,640 --> 00:14:21,240 Speaker 4: for a typical hedge fund or any sort of levered 257 00:14:21,280 --> 00:14:24,320 Speaker 4: strategy to work, right, The assets you buy have to 258 00:14:24,400 --> 00:14:27,080 Speaker 4: yield more than the cost of your funding. So if 259 00:14:27,080 --> 00:14:29,920 Speaker 4: you go back in time, we had a positive upward 260 00:14:29,960 --> 00:14:32,920 Speaker 4: sloping yield curve, which meant that you could borrow money 261 00:14:32,960 --> 00:14:36,760 Speaker 4: at one percent and buy assets to three percent, and 262 00:14:37,080 --> 00:14:39,400 Speaker 4: so you could level that up. And then even when 263 00:14:39,440 --> 00:14:41,960 Speaker 4: we had you know, two year notes here at half 264 00:14:42,000 --> 00:14:46,360 Speaker 4: a percent, you could borrow money and buy two year 265 00:14:46,480 --> 00:14:50,760 Speaker 4: jgbs FX, hedge it back and generated two percent kind 266 00:14:50,760 --> 00:14:53,960 Speaker 4: of quasi risk free return. And so there were many 267 00:14:54,000 --> 00:14:58,000 Speaker 4: similar sort of traits that you could do. Historically that 268 00:14:58,480 --> 00:15:01,520 Speaker 4: was what I think fuel the of these strategies right 269 00:15:01,880 --> 00:15:05,160 Speaker 4: and now if you come to today, leverage is expensive. 270 00:15:05,560 --> 00:15:09,400 Speaker 4: Most multi strategy funds are probably funding themselves at SOFA 271 00:15:09,480 --> 00:15:12,320 Speaker 4: plus some spread, so maybe a six percent, and the 272 00:15:12,360 --> 00:15:15,440 Speaker 4: coupons you can buy they're all much lower because we 273 00:15:15,480 --> 00:15:20,000 Speaker 4: have an inwarded yokurve where you know, sofur is much 274 00:15:20,040 --> 00:15:22,760 Speaker 4: higher than where any any sort of coupon you can buy. 275 00:15:23,160 --> 00:15:25,840 Speaker 4: So a lot of the strategies that are carry type 276 00:15:25,880 --> 00:15:29,040 Speaker 4: strategies don't work as well, But then you have all 277 00:15:29,080 --> 00:15:32,560 Speaker 4: these other sort of quasi RV type thing where you're 278 00:15:32,600 --> 00:15:35,880 Speaker 4: long and short different things, and those sort of strategies 279 00:15:35,920 --> 00:15:37,640 Speaker 4: tend to do better in this environment. 280 00:15:38,360 --> 00:15:41,880 Speaker 2: So in addition to of course all the infrastructure and 281 00:15:41,920 --> 00:15:44,840 Speaker 2: all that, the importance of a strong risk management at 282 00:15:44,840 --> 00:15:46,200 Speaker 2: the top. And I want to talk about that further 283 00:15:46,240 --> 00:15:48,920 Speaker 2: because I can think of a couple of ways in 284 00:15:48,960 --> 00:15:53,000 Speaker 2: which risk management might be expressed. One is, obviously, people 285 00:15:53,000 --> 00:15:56,520 Speaker 2: get fired somewhat quickly for poor returns. If a manager's 286 00:15:56,520 --> 00:15:58,960 Speaker 2: strategy or approach isn't working, they're not going to be 287 00:15:59,040 --> 00:16:02,680 Speaker 2: held around for long. I imagine another element too is 288 00:16:03,560 --> 00:16:07,840 Speaker 2: style drift and making sure that pods are actually investing 289 00:16:07,920 --> 00:16:10,160 Speaker 2: in the way in which they're sort of mandated, because 290 00:16:10,160 --> 00:16:13,640 Speaker 2: if you want that diversification benefit, you don't want, you know, 291 00:16:13,720 --> 00:16:17,000 Speaker 2: some random let's say, or some quant strategy or whatever 292 00:16:17,320 --> 00:16:20,520 Speaker 2: to be like quietly really just going along super micro 293 00:16:20,720 --> 00:16:23,160 Speaker 2: and in video or finding a way to make just 294 00:16:23,200 --> 00:16:26,760 Speaker 2: do a buy AI strategy, because that's what's out right 295 00:16:26,760 --> 00:16:29,360 Speaker 2: now to juice return. So talk to us a little 296 00:16:29,360 --> 00:16:32,400 Speaker 2: bit more about the risk management component in terms of 297 00:16:32,440 --> 00:16:36,240 Speaker 2: like allocating capital internally and making sure that the managers 298 00:16:36,280 --> 00:16:39,320 Speaker 2: are actually not all crowded into the same traits. 299 00:16:39,880 --> 00:16:43,200 Speaker 4: So this is a super interesting topic, Joe, and I 300 00:16:43,240 --> 00:16:45,120 Speaker 4: think you know this is I think the most important 301 00:16:45,400 --> 00:16:47,640 Speaker 4: topic of the moment. So if you think about it, 302 00:16:47,680 --> 00:16:50,440 Speaker 4: there's a conservation of risk, and it's just like conservation 303 00:16:50,480 --> 00:16:52,320 Speaker 4: of energy, right, So you know you can't just get 304 00:16:52,440 --> 00:16:55,400 Speaker 4: rid of risk. It just gets transformed and it gets 305 00:16:55,440 --> 00:16:58,160 Speaker 4: passed around from one person to the other person, right, 306 00:16:58,200 --> 00:17:01,440 Speaker 4: because it's a complex system, you know, that's what happens. 307 00:17:01,600 --> 00:17:04,480 Speaker 4: So if you think about what the multi strategies are doing, 308 00:17:04,960 --> 00:17:07,920 Speaker 4: in a sense, is what the banks were doing ten 309 00:17:08,000 --> 00:17:11,040 Speaker 4: fifteen years ago, before the vocal rule and before the 310 00:17:11,080 --> 00:17:14,439 Speaker 4: dot frank came about. Right. So if you had some 311 00:17:14,560 --> 00:17:17,520 Speaker 4: off the run treasuries and you know somebody had to 312 00:17:17,560 --> 00:17:19,520 Speaker 4: sell it, you took it down and you put it 313 00:17:19,560 --> 00:17:21,439 Speaker 4: on your balance sheet. You know, when I started at 314 00:17:21,520 --> 00:17:24,800 Speaker 4: Citybank twenty plus years ago, we had twenty people on 315 00:17:24,840 --> 00:17:28,159 Speaker 4: the spot trading desk and we had an auto trader 316 00:17:28,240 --> 00:17:31,880 Speaker 4: machine which worked some of the time, but then when 317 00:17:31,960 --> 00:17:35,560 Speaker 4: something happened, some sort of event happened, the machine would 318 00:17:35,560 --> 00:17:37,080 Speaker 4: not be able to do it and it would get 319 00:17:37,119 --> 00:17:40,040 Speaker 4: passed to the humans that were on the desk. Now, 320 00:17:40,040 --> 00:17:42,680 Speaker 4: you go to Citybank, you'd be hard pressed to find 321 00:17:42,680 --> 00:17:47,119 Speaker 4: maybe three spot traders, and the machines basically taken over, right, 322 00:17:47,359 --> 00:17:49,960 Speaker 4: So all of those people that were there, they've all 323 00:17:50,000 --> 00:17:52,800 Speaker 4: moved to the multi strategy funds. Right. So the typical 324 00:17:52,880 --> 00:17:57,440 Speaker 4: multi strategy fund has specific pods that are focused on 325 00:17:57,520 --> 00:18:01,280 Speaker 4: trading one particular asset. So in many cases, you know, 326 00:18:01,320 --> 00:18:03,960 Speaker 4: you'd have a trader he would only trade five year 327 00:18:04,040 --> 00:18:06,880 Speaker 4: notes and that's all he's doing, you know, that's all 328 00:18:06,920 --> 00:18:09,760 Speaker 4: his mandate will allow him to do. And so what 329 00:18:09,800 --> 00:18:12,760 Speaker 4: this does from a systemic point of view is we've 330 00:18:12,760 --> 00:18:15,720 Speaker 4: shifted all the risks that was on the bank's balance 331 00:18:15,760 --> 00:18:18,640 Speaker 4: sheet onto these funds. Right, So which is which is great? 332 00:18:18,640 --> 00:18:21,719 Speaker 4: I mean, which is not a bad thing. But if 333 00:18:21,760 --> 00:18:24,600 Speaker 4: you think about how the capitalist now managed, right. So, 334 00:18:24,640 --> 00:18:27,760 Speaker 4: we always we're very good at coming up with complex 335 00:18:27,880 --> 00:18:30,720 Speaker 4: formulas to calculate risk and do all that. And we 336 00:18:30,760 --> 00:18:33,959 Speaker 4: saw that with the VR issues in the past. We 337 00:18:34,000 --> 00:18:37,800 Speaker 4: had a Black Monday episode with the CPI constant proportion 338 00:18:37,880 --> 00:18:40,480 Speaker 4: portfolio insurance. It turned out be a bad idea. And 339 00:18:40,520 --> 00:18:43,840 Speaker 4: then we also start with the CEO crisis where we 340 00:18:43,960 --> 00:18:47,280 Speaker 4: had you know this you know, single correlation parameter. We 341 00:18:47,280 --> 00:18:50,520 Speaker 4: were using the models and wasn't capturing the real dynamics 342 00:18:50,560 --> 00:18:53,439 Speaker 4: in the underlying portfolio, right, so we've always had this 343 00:18:53,560 --> 00:18:58,120 Speaker 4: issue with you know, creating these mouse traps to manage risk, 344 00:18:58,200 --> 00:19:01,280 Speaker 4: and often they create other problems. So I think one 345 00:19:01,320 --> 00:19:04,080 Speaker 4: of the issues now with the growth in the multistrat 346 00:19:04,200 --> 00:19:07,119 Speaker 4: universe and the fact that they are fairly large, is 347 00:19:07,440 --> 00:19:10,200 Speaker 4: if you have a stat ar book and you're running, 348 00:19:10,400 --> 00:19:13,600 Speaker 4: you know, at fifty by fifty start our book, and 349 00:19:13,680 --> 00:19:16,440 Speaker 4: something happens or you decide like you want to de risk, 350 00:19:16,680 --> 00:19:18,760 Speaker 4: it's fairly easy. You could probably get out of the 351 00:19:18,760 --> 00:19:21,840 Speaker 4: whole book in no time. But let's say you are 352 00:19:22,160 --> 00:19:25,840 Speaker 4: a forty billion dollar fund that now has levered that 353 00:19:25,880 --> 00:19:29,240 Speaker 4: capital up four or five times, and now something happens 354 00:19:29,320 --> 00:19:31,920 Speaker 4: and you need to de risk. There is no other 355 00:19:32,520 --> 00:19:34,840 Speaker 4: side for that trade. There's no balance sheet on the 356 00:19:34,840 --> 00:19:37,919 Speaker 4: other side. And we saw that in March of twenty twenty. 357 00:19:38,200 --> 00:19:41,240 Speaker 4: People had all these basis traits because if you think 358 00:19:41,240 --> 00:19:44,119 Speaker 4: about it, when you don't have carry, when you don't 359 00:19:44,160 --> 00:19:47,240 Speaker 4: have an upward sloping eel curve, a lot of the 360 00:19:47,280 --> 00:19:49,800 Speaker 4: traits tend to be this sort of fixed income RV 361 00:19:49,920 --> 00:19:53,280 Speaker 4: type stuff where we are doing these spaces stuff, and 362 00:19:53,640 --> 00:19:56,480 Speaker 4: many of those bases started to blow up in March 363 00:19:56,520 --> 00:20:00,600 Speaker 4: of twenty twenty, and then the FED literally had into 364 00:20:00,760 --> 00:20:04,080 Speaker 4: So we have this sort of thing where the size 365 00:20:04,359 --> 00:20:08,440 Speaker 4: of the overall funds is so big. We have about 366 00:20:08,480 --> 00:20:11,000 Speaker 4: four hundred billion at the moment, and they're growing at 367 00:20:11,040 --> 00:20:13,679 Speaker 4: ten to fifteen percent a year, and you take that 368 00:20:13,800 --> 00:20:17,760 Speaker 4: and you multiply by three to get the actual dollars invested. 369 00:20:17,800 --> 00:20:20,200 Speaker 4: So they're about a trillion two dollars in these sort 370 00:20:20,200 --> 00:20:23,200 Speaker 4: of platforms and they're all risk managed the same way. 371 00:20:23,800 --> 00:20:26,440 Speaker 4: And I think that is the problem we could. 372 00:20:26,200 --> 00:20:30,159 Speaker 2: Have outside though of the big event, whether it's like 373 00:20:30,160 --> 00:20:32,800 Speaker 2: a black Bonday day or whether it's outside you know, 374 00:20:32,920 --> 00:20:35,520 Speaker 2: March twenty twenty, with the relative value in treasury, it's 375 00:20:35,520 --> 00:20:39,080 Speaker 2: like in normal times, just how would you describe like 376 00:20:39,160 --> 00:20:41,520 Speaker 2: the sort of day to day blocking and tackling of 377 00:20:41,560 --> 00:20:44,119 Speaker 2: good risk management of evaluating POTT. 378 00:20:45,000 --> 00:20:47,720 Speaker 3: Just to add to that, I'm really curious so multi 379 00:20:47,720 --> 00:20:51,560 Speaker 3: strategy funds, it's a collection of different strategies obviously, so 380 00:20:51,600 --> 00:20:54,720 Speaker 3: how are risk managers getting a sort of holistic view 381 00:20:54,880 --> 00:20:57,960 Speaker 3: of that business? And then also I'm super curious if 382 00:20:57,960 --> 00:21:01,680 Speaker 3: they're all using the same software. Like I remember writing 383 00:21:01,720 --> 00:21:05,160 Speaker 3: about Black Rocks Aladdin and the portfolio management tool there 384 00:21:05,200 --> 00:21:07,800 Speaker 3: like almost a decade ago now, But I'm curious, is 385 00:21:07,840 --> 00:21:10,560 Speaker 3: everyone using the same sort of system to do this? 386 00:21:11,359 --> 00:21:14,399 Speaker 4: Well, I don't know about all of them, but you know, 387 00:21:14,480 --> 00:21:16,800 Speaker 4: I can say that, you know, the risk thinking is 388 00:21:16,960 --> 00:21:19,520 Speaker 4: kind of similar in a lot of these firms in 389 00:21:19,520 --> 00:21:22,800 Speaker 4: the sense that imagine you had a dollar and you 390 00:21:22,960 --> 00:21:25,800 Speaker 4: levered it up to four dollars. Now you want to 391 00:21:25,840 --> 00:21:29,240 Speaker 4: make sure, let's say you've promised your LPs that you're 392 00:21:29,240 --> 00:21:31,399 Speaker 4: not going to lose more than ten percent. You know, 393 00:21:31,480 --> 00:21:34,800 Speaker 4: you want to manage each of the underlying strategies that 394 00:21:34,880 --> 00:21:38,720 Speaker 4: you've deployed capital into to not lose more than three percent, right, 395 00:21:38,800 --> 00:21:41,439 Speaker 4: because then, by definition, if all of them lose at 396 00:21:41,440 --> 00:21:44,600 Speaker 4: the same time, you've now blown through your ten percent limit. 397 00:21:45,080 --> 00:21:48,480 Speaker 4: So that means that they all end up with some 398 00:21:48,520 --> 00:21:54,880 Speaker 4: sort of risk management that is not necessarily bad when 399 00:21:54,920 --> 00:21:57,720 Speaker 4: you look at the platform as a whole, but from 400 00:21:57,960 --> 00:22:00,880 Speaker 4: the perspective of what it does on a system stomic basis, 401 00:22:00,920 --> 00:22:03,400 Speaker 4: it's not great. So I know, Joe mentioned this thing 402 00:22:03,400 --> 00:22:06,399 Speaker 4: about the basis blowing up in March or twenty twenty, 403 00:22:06,880 --> 00:22:10,840 Speaker 4: but you have this episode every other month where you 404 00:22:10,840 --> 00:22:15,080 Speaker 4: could have some random event which has nothing of any 405 00:22:15,119 --> 00:22:19,440 Speaker 4: real significance, could cause like a little unwind of positions, right. 406 00:22:19,480 --> 00:22:21,440 Speaker 4: So what I mean by that is, so let's say 407 00:22:21,440 --> 00:22:25,240 Speaker 4: you're going into the Polish elections last year in September, 408 00:22:25,640 --> 00:22:29,440 Speaker 4: you look at Polish rates and europoland the currency all 409 00:22:29,520 --> 00:22:32,280 Speaker 4: kind of started to move in the wrong direction, meaning 410 00:22:32,320 --> 00:22:35,480 Speaker 4: Polish rates blew up and Europoland started a rally. And 411 00:22:35,640 --> 00:22:38,600 Speaker 4: part of the issue there is that when you have 412 00:22:38,880 --> 00:22:41,600 Speaker 4: a whole bunch of strategies that are all kind of 413 00:22:41,680 --> 00:22:46,240 Speaker 4: risk managed the same way, it's no longer about the fundamentals, right. 414 00:22:46,560 --> 00:22:48,159 Speaker 4: If the P and L starts to move in a 415 00:22:48,200 --> 00:22:51,280 Speaker 4: certain direction, you now have to de risk your book, 416 00:22:51,640 --> 00:22:53,600 Speaker 4: and that causes these events. 417 00:22:53,760 --> 00:22:55,840 Speaker 2: Well, this is what I really want to get it 418 00:22:55,960 --> 00:22:58,040 Speaker 2: because I want to talk about you know, you could 419 00:22:58,080 --> 00:23:01,359 Speaker 2: see the chart of RPL and it shoots up and 420 00:23:01,400 --> 00:23:03,480 Speaker 2: then a month later it's back to where it was. 421 00:23:03,800 --> 00:23:07,600 Speaker 2: What is that day to day risk management process that 422 00:23:07,880 --> 00:23:11,240 Speaker 2: causes trades to all go in one direction like that? Again, 423 00:23:11,320 --> 00:23:14,280 Speaker 2: like outside of like the crazy times where it's like 424 00:23:14,520 --> 00:23:17,399 Speaker 2: a pandemic hit like day to day, if I'm a 425 00:23:17,480 --> 00:23:20,280 Speaker 2: manager at a pod shop and I have like the 426 00:23:20,320 --> 00:23:22,720 Speaker 2: platform over me evaluating my risk, like talk to us 427 00:23:22,760 --> 00:23:25,520 Speaker 2: about that process and how that informs the risks I'm 428 00:23:25,520 --> 00:23:26,160 Speaker 2: willing to take. 429 00:23:26,440 --> 00:23:30,640 Speaker 4: Yes, the risk management is almost algorithmic, right, So it's 430 00:23:30,680 --> 00:23:33,600 Speaker 4: not even because I don't think it. It'd be very 431 00:23:33,680 --> 00:23:37,600 Speaker 4: hard for the risk manager at some massive pot to 432 00:23:37,680 --> 00:23:40,840 Speaker 4: know every individual position, so they don't really kind of 433 00:23:40,880 --> 00:23:43,040 Speaker 4: they kind of understand the whole thing, but they don't 434 00:23:43,080 --> 00:23:46,600 Speaker 4: necessarily know that you know X or wise you know 435 00:23:47,359 --> 00:23:50,680 Speaker 4: what it is. So so essentially what happens is your 436 00:23:50,720 --> 00:23:53,240 Speaker 4: P and L kind of drives risk management. Right, So 437 00:23:53,280 --> 00:23:57,479 Speaker 4: if you draw down capital, you know you're getting delevered, right, 438 00:23:57,680 --> 00:24:01,360 Speaker 4: and not only are you getting delevered. Let's take Poland 439 00:24:01,480 --> 00:24:04,240 Speaker 4: is a good example, and we have a position in Poland, 440 00:24:04,280 --> 00:24:08,240 Speaker 4: so we kind of followed closely. So imagine now you're 441 00:24:08,280 --> 00:24:10,679 Speaker 4: at a POD and now you have a Europoland position. 442 00:24:10,760 --> 00:24:13,320 Speaker 4: Now you have to take it off because you know 443 00:24:13,359 --> 00:24:15,439 Speaker 4: it's gone against you, and you you know if you 444 00:24:15,480 --> 00:24:18,240 Speaker 4: lose more than three percent, you're going to get capital 445 00:24:18,320 --> 00:24:20,560 Speaker 4: is going to get cut in half, and you lose 446 00:24:20,600 --> 00:24:23,240 Speaker 4: five six percent, you're probably getting stopped out, right, So 447 00:24:23,280 --> 00:24:27,480 Speaker 4: that's typically how the pot capital gets allocated. So now 448 00:24:28,000 --> 00:24:31,679 Speaker 4: you are now de risking that Europoland position. Which then 449 00:24:31,760 --> 00:24:34,399 Speaker 4: causes everybody else to also de risk as well. So 450 00:24:34,840 --> 00:24:37,480 Speaker 4: it's not even like a risk management thing. It's just 451 00:24:37,560 --> 00:24:42,040 Speaker 4: the structure where everybody is allocating capital in the same way, 452 00:24:42,600 --> 00:24:45,439 Speaker 4: which means that like an innoquous thing, like you know, 453 00:24:45,560 --> 00:24:49,120 Speaker 4: somebody literally coughing at some place causes something to move 454 00:24:49,160 --> 00:24:51,280 Speaker 4: and then next thing, you know, a whole bunch of 455 00:24:51,280 --> 00:24:53,080 Speaker 4: people have to unwind the positions. 456 00:24:53,840 --> 00:24:58,080 Speaker 2: So diversification in investing is generally good and people like it. 457 00:24:58,119 --> 00:25:00,359 Speaker 2: And one way you can diversify is over time. So 458 00:25:00,400 --> 00:25:03,200 Speaker 2: it's like in theory, you know, it's like people buy 459 00:25:03,280 --> 00:25:05,560 Speaker 2: the SMP every two weeks in there four one k 460 00:25:05,760 --> 00:25:09,000 Speaker 2: or something like that. But it sounds likely your example 461 00:25:09,240 --> 00:25:12,640 Speaker 2: is that the pod manager does not have the ability 462 00:25:12,680 --> 00:25:15,040 Speaker 2: to diversify with time, that as soon as the move 463 00:25:15,160 --> 00:25:19,160 Speaker 2: goes against them, they don't really have the luxury to say, yeah, 464 00:25:19,200 --> 00:25:21,200 Speaker 2: well it's just a brief thing and it'll be back 465 00:25:21,240 --> 00:25:25,280 Speaker 2: to normal like that. Mechanically, they can't let it. They 466 00:25:25,320 --> 00:25:27,080 Speaker 2: can't let the position lose for very long. 467 00:25:27,359 --> 00:25:29,919 Speaker 4: Yeah, I think so. And also the other aspect of 468 00:25:29,920 --> 00:25:32,760 Speaker 4: that which you touched upon is the fact that you're 469 00:25:32,840 --> 00:25:38,800 Speaker 4: not maximizing long term returns you're maximizing returns per unit 470 00:25:38,840 --> 00:25:43,000 Speaker 4: of time, right. So, so what it means is, let's say, 471 00:25:43,040 --> 00:25:44,879 Speaker 4: you know, let's take a different example. Let's say you 472 00:25:44,880 --> 00:25:47,840 Speaker 4: have a stock. So any given stock on any random 473 00:25:47,920 --> 00:25:50,280 Speaker 4: day is just some beta to the S and P. Right, 474 00:25:50,359 --> 00:25:52,640 Speaker 4: It's just it's going to move along with the rest 475 00:25:52,640 --> 00:25:55,560 Speaker 4: of the market. Unless there's some stock specific news. It's 476 00:25:55,600 --> 00:25:58,080 Speaker 4: just going to keep up with that, except that when 477 00:25:58,080 --> 00:26:00,280 Speaker 4: you get into an event, like you have have an 478 00:26:00,280 --> 00:26:04,480 Speaker 4: earnings release or Apple's vision pros getting released at that time, 479 00:26:04,920 --> 00:26:07,760 Speaker 4: Now there is actually an event, and now you have 480 00:26:07,840 --> 00:26:09,520 Speaker 4: to take a view on whether it's going to go 481 00:26:10,320 --> 00:26:13,199 Speaker 4: up or down at that point in time. Right. So 482 00:26:13,440 --> 00:26:16,920 Speaker 4: what happens with this sort of pot capital and that 483 00:26:17,320 --> 00:26:20,560 Speaker 4: being a bigger part of the market, is that you 484 00:26:20,720 --> 00:26:24,199 Speaker 4: now have to basically take a view on this event, 485 00:26:24,440 --> 00:26:27,520 Speaker 4: which is an earnings release. Now, if it turns out 486 00:26:27,600 --> 00:26:29,840 Speaker 4: that all the parts think that the earnings are going 487 00:26:29,880 --> 00:26:31,880 Speaker 4: to be good, and if the earnings actually is not good, 488 00:26:32,359 --> 00:26:34,119 Speaker 4: now we know that the stock is going to have 489 00:26:34,160 --> 00:26:37,679 Speaker 4: a massive reaction because you know, everybody will try to 490 00:26:37,680 --> 00:26:40,080 Speaker 4: get out at the first possible time, right, So you 491 00:26:40,560 --> 00:26:44,919 Speaker 4: create these sort of mini crashes in equities and in 492 00:26:44,960 --> 00:26:48,160 Speaker 4: other markets because of the way risk is managed, right, 493 00:26:48,359 --> 00:26:51,280 Speaker 4: I imagine if I were to sort of look at 494 00:26:51,320 --> 00:26:54,479 Speaker 4: my position every day and say, on every little blip, 495 00:26:54,640 --> 00:26:57,199 Speaker 4: I'm going to take all my risks down, and not 496 00:26:57,240 --> 00:26:59,680 Speaker 4: only take my risk down, but take other positions I 497 00:26:59,720 --> 00:27:03,120 Speaker 4: might have also down. That's going to cause these sort 498 00:27:03,119 --> 00:27:06,960 Speaker 4: of systemic events, which I think is actually an opportunity. 499 00:27:06,960 --> 00:27:09,639 Speaker 4: If you're not playing that game and you're playing a 500 00:27:09,680 --> 00:27:12,840 Speaker 4: slightly longer term game, then it's a slightly it's a 501 00:27:12,840 --> 00:27:27,359 Speaker 4: great opportunity. 502 00:27:28,840 --> 00:27:31,520 Speaker 3: So just to hammer this point home, in addition to 503 00:27:31,680 --> 00:27:35,200 Speaker 3: the sort of short termism that you just described, there's 504 00:27:35,200 --> 00:27:38,800 Speaker 3: a sort of reflexivity that's happening here too, where if 505 00:27:38,800 --> 00:27:41,800 Speaker 3: a position starts to trade against you and everyone gets 506 00:27:41,800 --> 00:27:44,560 Speaker 3: out at the same time, that makes it worse. But 507 00:27:44,680 --> 00:27:47,560 Speaker 3: also if a position is going in your favor, then 508 00:27:47,600 --> 00:27:50,879 Speaker 3: everyone crowds in and that gives it momentum and it 509 00:27:51,080 --> 00:27:55,160 Speaker 3: sort of exacerbates the up crashes. As Joe would say. 510 00:27:55,440 --> 00:27:59,040 Speaker 4: Yeah, I think to some extent that is probably the case. 511 00:27:59,040 --> 00:28:02,119 Speaker 4: But I would say we probably have the ETFs to 512 00:28:02,160 --> 00:28:05,280 Speaker 4: blame for that, just because of the way the ETF 513 00:28:05,359 --> 00:28:07,560 Speaker 4: market is, and you know, a lot of what is 514 00:28:07,600 --> 00:28:12,000 Speaker 4: happening now is money flowing into ETFs, which then end 515 00:28:12,080 --> 00:28:15,960 Speaker 4: up buying you know, whatever is the underlying index of stocks, 516 00:28:16,520 --> 00:28:18,920 Speaker 4: and then you end up with these stocks that don't 517 00:28:18,920 --> 00:28:20,879 Speaker 4: have a lot of free flow, right, so you have 518 00:28:21,359 --> 00:28:24,320 Speaker 4: large inflows. I mean this is not just a US phenomena. 519 00:28:24,480 --> 00:28:26,920 Speaker 4: Like you look at what happened in Europe here to day, right, 520 00:28:27,240 --> 00:28:30,119 Speaker 4: the top five six stocks in market gap are up 521 00:28:30,200 --> 00:28:32,879 Speaker 4: like fifteen percent, right, and the same thing in Korea, 522 00:28:33,000 --> 00:28:36,080 Speaker 4: same thing now, So everywhere in the world, as more 523 00:28:36,160 --> 00:28:40,200 Speaker 4: money flows into these passive vehicles, I think it generates 524 00:28:40,240 --> 00:28:43,680 Speaker 4: this effect where people are just buying it, you know, 525 00:28:43,760 --> 00:28:47,680 Speaker 4: without actually looking at the valuation. So taken VideA, as 526 00:28:47,720 --> 00:28:49,560 Speaker 4: long as we have new money coming into the S 527 00:28:49,640 --> 00:28:52,160 Speaker 4: and P five hundred and video stocks going to go 528 00:28:52,280 --> 00:28:55,280 Speaker 4: up and until something happens, as earnings comes out or 529 00:28:55,320 --> 00:28:58,440 Speaker 4: some something else changes, this thing sort of drives the 530 00:28:58,520 --> 00:29:02,120 Speaker 4: momentum effect. The pods, I think have a little bit 531 00:29:02,160 --> 00:29:06,480 Speaker 4: to do with it, But I would imagine the typical 532 00:29:06,880 --> 00:29:11,160 Speaker 4: long short equity pod. You know, it's sector neutral and 533 00:29:11,520 --> 00:29:13,960 Speaker 4: market neutral and all kinds of neutrals. So basically they 534 00:29:14,000 --> 00:29:18,320 Speaker 4: try to neutralize every possible factor that they could lose 535 00:29:18,320 --> 00:29:20,880 Speaker 4: money against, right, And so that's what they do. I 536 00:29:20,880 --> 00:29:23,160 Speaker 4: actually think that they might be a new factor that 537 00:29:23,240 --> 00:29:26,440 Speaker 4: we might have to have, which is the multi factor 538 00:29:26,520 --> 00:29:29,959 Speaker 4: multi strategy pod factor, right, because this is a factor 539 00:29:30,040 --> 00:29:32,000 Speaker 4: like if you have a stock in which a lot 540 00:29:32,000 --> 00:29:35,160 Speaker 4: of multi strategy pods have a position, you know, that 541 00:29:35,240 --> 00:29:37,800 Speaker 4: might make that stock behave differently. 542 00:29:38,720 --> 00:29:40,600 Speaker 2: By the way, super Micro, I think it was up 543 00:29:40,640 --> 00:29:42,120 Speaker 2: about six what did I say? It was like up 544 00:29:42,160 --> 00:29:44,600 Speaker 2: about sixty dollars on the day when we started the episode. 545 00:29:45,080 --> 00:29:47,959 Speaker 2: It's up eighty anyone now. So when we see these 546 00:29:48,080 --> 00:29:50,360 Speaker 2: crazy moves on the upside, it's like, okay, there isn't 547 00:29:50,440 --> 00:29:54,520 Speaker 2: much free float. There's this sort of uninformed demand from 548 00:29:54,560 --> 00:29:56,720 Speaker 2: the ETF flows. And then when we see like the 549 00:29:56,760 --> 00:29:59,640 Speaker 2: crazy moves on the down it's a lot of pod 550 00:30:00,480 --> 00:30:02,840 Speaker 2: all with the same risk profiles. How quickly do they 551 00:30:02,840 --> 00:30:05,000 Speaker 2: get fired? Like in my mind like, oh they have 552 00:30:05,040 --> 00:30:06,920 Speaker 2: a bad few weeks or a bead quarter a bit. 553 00:30:07,040 --> 00:30:10,960 Speaker 2: What is the reality of like longevity And how quickly 554 00:30:11,000 --> 00:30:12,280 Speaker 2: do they just say you're not cutting. 555 00:30:12,040 --> 00:30:14,880 Speaker 4: It, you know, my guess And this is not you know, 556 00:30:14,920 --> 00:30:18,760 Speaker 4: by any way scientific you know sort of thing is probably, 557 00:30:19,120 --> 00:30:22,480 Speaker 4: you know, it's not very long, but you'd be surprised 558 00:30:22,520 --> 00:30:25,800 Speaker 4: that a lot of these fairly large platforms have managers 559 00:30:25,800 --> 00:30:29,280 Speaker 4: that have been around forever, right, and they all have 560 00:30:29,440 --> 00:30:31,760 Speaker 4: something in common. One of the things is if you 561 00:30:31,800 --> 00:30:34,720 Speaker 4: have a very high sharp ratio strategy, so a strategy 562 00:30:34,760 --> 00:30:39,080 Speaker 4: where you know you're boltild these small relative to your returns, 563 00:30:39,560 --> 00:30:42,480 Speaker 4: then you're more likely to survive in this sort of 564 00:30:42,560 --> 00:30:45,320 Speaker 4: pod environment, right because if you have you know your 565 00:30:45,360 --> 00:30:49,040 Speaker 4: drawdowns are limited, and then every once in a while 566 00:30:49,160 --> 00:30:51,520 Speaker 4: you might have a big blow up, but then you 567 00:30:51,560 --> 00:30:54,840 Speaker 4: know that's just part of the high sharp ratio game. Right. 568 00:30:54,880 --> 00:30:58,160 Speaker 4: So there's a very nice paper by Jean Philippe Buschat 569 00:30:58,240 --> 00:31:01,600 Speaker 4: that shows that most of these high sharp ratio strategies 570 00:31:01,960 --> 00:31:05,320 Speaker 4: often tend to have a negative sq to P an 571 00:31:05,400 --> 00:31:07,320 Speaker 4: L profile, which kind of makes sense. Like, if you're 572 00:31:07,360 --> 00:31:10,040 Speaker 4: going to sell s and P options every day, that's 573 00:31:10,040 --> 00:31:13,000 Speaker 4: going to be a very high sharp ratio strategy until 574 00:31:13,040 --> 00:31:15,640 Speaker 4: something happens and then you lose three four years with 575 00:31:15,760 --> 00:31:19,760 Speaker 4: a P and L. Right, So I think the longevity 576 00:31:20,080 --> 00:31:23,160 Speaker 4: of a typical part is not that high, but you'd 577 00:31:23,160 --> 00:31:27,200 Speaker 4: be surprised how many of these managers have done extremely 578 00:31:27,240 --> 00:31:30,240 Speaker 4: well over time because they have this sort of high 579 00:31:30,280 --> 00:31:34,000 Speaker 4: sharp ratio strategies that they can then survive. 580 00:31:34,600 --> 00:31:38,360 Speaker 3: Some of this reminds me of the original discussion I 581 00:31:38,440 --> 00:31:41,000 Speaker 3: guess it would have been more than ten years ago now, 582 00:31:41,040 --> 00:31:45,520 Speaker 3: but around algorithmic or machine learning trading, where like the 583 00:31:45,560 --> 00:31:48,760 Speaker 3: big discussion point was, Okay, you get a news release 584 00:31:49,040 --> 00:31:52,920 Speaker 3: that comes out, maybe it's something company specific, maybe it's 585 00:31:52,960 --> 00:31:56,960 Speaker 3: something macro, like the latest jobs release, and all the 586 00:31:57,040 --> 00:32:01,040 Speaker 3: machines react to it. Sometimes they actually are read or 587 00:32:01,040 --> 00:32:03,480 Speaker 3: at least back then, they would pull back from the 588 00:32:03,520 --> 00:32:05,480 Speaker 3: market and just wait a little bit. But the idea 589 00:32:05,560 --> 00:32:08,240 Speaker 3: is that you kind of get this gap where if 590 00:32:08,240 --> 00:32:11,479 Speaker 3: you're not a machine or an algorithm, maybe there's an 591 00:32:11,560 --> 00:32:15,920 Speaker 3: opportunity there in the market. Maybe you can be smarter 592 00:32:16,120 --> 00:32:18,160 Speaker 3: I guess than the machines that are sort of like 593 00:32:18,320 --> 00:32:20,480 Speaker 3: going on on wrote code. 594 00:32:20,840 --> 00:32:22,760 Speaker 4: Yeah. I think, if you think about it, the biggest 595 00:32:22,800 --> 00:32:27,000 Speaker 4: opportunities for slightly longer term investors. So if you are 596 00:32:27,520 --> 00:32:30,280 Speaker 4: let's say your time horizon is not a month or 597 00:32:30,360 --> 00:32:33,640 Speaker 4: three months now, this gives you a greater opportunity because 598 00:32:33,640 --> 00:32:37,640 Speaker 4: you obviously get these big drawdowns every few months. Right. 599 00:32:37,720 --> 00:32:40,800 Speaker 4: So so in my personal view, I think, you know, 600 00:32:40,840 --> 00:32:43,240 Speaker 4: we have some active ETFs and and that we think 601 00:32:43,280 --> 00:32:46,440 Speaker 4: of that as longer term capital, and we're looking at 602 00:32:46,480 --> 00:32:49,640 Speaker 4: creating some sort of a drawdown structure where we actually 603 00:32:50,160 --> 00:32:53,440 Speaker 4: wait for these big drawdowns that are caused by the 604 00:32:53,480 --> 00:32:57,600 Speaker 4: pods and then use that to actually participate in these 605 00:32:58,040 --> 00:33:00,360 Speaker 4: in these moves. And then that in case, could be 606 00:33:00,400 --> 00:33:04,600 Speaker 4: a very interesting way to take advantage of this stuff. 607 00:33:04,960 --> 00:33:08,040 Speaker 4: But anytime you have in al garden that decides how 608 00:33:08,120 --> 00:33:11,880 Speaker 4: capital gets allocated and it's sort of rule space, you 609 00:33:12,120 --> 00:33:14,080 Speaker 4: kind of know that it's going to create a problem 610 00:33:14,160 --> 00:33:17,000 Speaker 4: the end, because the market is sort of a complex machine. 611 00:33:17,280 --> 00:33:20,280 Speaker 4: So anytime you think you've found like some risk mousetrap, 612 00:33:20,680 --> 00:33:23,800 Speaker 4: you know it's probably going to create other issues elsewhere. 613 00:33:24,320 --> 00:33:26,160 Speaker 3: This might be a simplistic question, but how do you 614 00:33:26,160 --> 00:33:28,800 Speaker 3: measure drawdowns? How do you know that those are happening 615 00:33:28,920 --> 00:33:32,200 Speaker 3: and impacting a particular stock or factor. 616 00:33:32,760 --> 00:33:34,920 Speaker 4: So you can kind of look at that on a 617 00:33:35,360 --> 00:33:38,840 Speaker 4: kind of a micro scale by certain specific assets that 618 00:33:38,880 --> 00:33:42,080 Speaker 4: are in focus. So for instance, like let's say you're 619 00:33:42,120 --> 00:33:44,920 Speaker 4: going into an earnings release and you sort of see 620 00:33:44,960 --> 00:33:48,520 Speaker 4: that the stock missed earnings and then has a massive 621 00:33:48,560 --> 00:33:52,480 Speaker 4: reaction and it's a several sigma move, and you'd sort 622 00:33:52,480 --> 00:33:55,200 Speaker 4: of say, like, Okay, the company did miss earnings dis quarter, 623 00:33:55,600 --> 00:33:59,320 Speaker 4: but otherwise everything else seems to be fine. It shouldn't 624 00:33:59,360 --> 00:34:01,800 Speaker 4: be as big reaction. And you can kind of look 625 00:34:01,840 --> 00:34:05,240 Speaker 4: at these reactions from the past when they've missed earnings 626 00:34:05,560 --> 00:34:07,400 Speaker 4: and you'd find that, you know, the reactions are much 627 00:34:07,480 --> 00:34:10,040 Speaker 4: larger now, and part of that has to do with 628 00:34:10,080 --> 00:34:13,640 Speaker 4: the fact that a lot of the capital that is deployed, 629 00:34:13,760 --> 00:34:17,120 Speaker 4: apart from the ETFs, which are passive holders of this stuff, 630 00:34:17,520 --> 00:34:20,200 Speaker 4: the active management part of it is a lot of 631 00:34:20,200 --> 00:34:23,680 Speaker 4: these pots and multi strategy fonts, and that creates this 632 00:34:23,840 --> 00:34:27,400 Speaker 4: sort of behavior, not just inequities, but in other assets 633 00:34:27,440 --> 00:34:30,960 Speaker 4: as well. Like you'd get a really massive reaction in 634 00:34:31,000 --> 00:34:34,120 Speaker 4: treasuries for like some random thing, and you'd be like, 635 00:34:34,560 --> 00:34:37,319 Speaker 4: what has changed, Like economy hasn't really changed that much, 636 00:34:37,960 --> 00:34:42,160 Speaker 4: but because like everybody was one way now they all 637 00:34:42,200 --> 00:34:43,960 Speaker 4: have to kind of get out of the way, and 638 00:34:44,000 --> 00:34:47,040 Speaker 4: that creates like, like, take this CPI reaction. I mean, 639 00:34:47,239 --> 00:34:49,839 Speaker 4: you know, we had a big repricing the front end, 640 00:34:49,880 --> 00:34:52,000 Speaker 4: which kind of made sense, but you look at the 641 00:34:52,080 --> 00:34:54,600 Speaker 4: treasury move and you say, like, ah, does it really 642 00:34:54,800 --> 00:34:57,360 Speaker 4: make a big difference. In the grand scheme of things, 643 00:34:57,840 --> 00:35:01,480 Speaker 4: the one year forward ten years yields and the five 644 00:35:01,560 --> 00:35:04,760 Speaker 4: year yields are about the same. They are about four percent, 645 00:35:05,239 --> 00:35:09,839 Speaker 4: and so that hasn't really changed. But people's positions had 646 00:35:09,880 --> 00:35:13,680 Speaker 4: to be unbound, and that creates these sort of large reactions. 647 00:35:14,200 --> 00:35:16,359 Speaker 3: So one thing I was wondering, just going back to 648 00:35:16,680 --> 00:35:20,800 Speaker 3: why these types of investment firms seem to have proliferated 649 00:35:20,960 --> 00:35:23,880 Speaker 3: in recent years. I mean, to some extent, this was 650 00:35:24,239 --> 00:35:28,399 Speaker 3: the desired outcome of post two thousand and eight regulation. Again, 651 00:35:28,440 --> 00:35:32,160 Speaker 3: you make it more expensive to get leverage if you're 652 00:35:32,320 --> 00:35:34,880 Speaker 3: a bank. If you're a bank, you also can't trade 653 00:35:34,880 --> 00:35:38,040 Speaker 3: for your own account anymore, and so it all shifts 654 00:35:38,080 --> 00:35:41,880 Speaker 3: into I kind of hate this term nowadays, but the 655 00:35:41,920 --> 00:35:45,120 Speaker 3: shadow banking system, and it gets done there. So I 656 00:35:45,160 --> 00:35:49,640 Speaker 3: guess my question is how worried should we be about 657 00:35:49,800 --> 00:35:55,920 Speaker 3: this activity on a systemic basis? And then secondly, could 658 00:35:56,040 --> 00:36:00,840 Speaker 3: multi strategy pod shops be hit if we were to 659 00:36:01,000 --> 00:36:05,040 Speaker 3: see leverage get more expensive. So, for instance, there's a 660 00:36:05,040 --> 00:36:07,840 Speaker 3: lot of talk right now about the basis trade in 661 00:36:07,960 --> 00:36:11,520 Speaker 3: treasuries and maybe regulators are going to start cracking down 662 00:36:11,560 --> 00:36:14,840 Speaker 3: on that or making it more expensive to use treasury futures, 663 00:36:14,880 --> 00:36:17,320 Speaker 3: which are basically a source of leverage in that market. 664 00:36:17,520 --> 00:36:18,399 Speaker 3: Is that a risk here? 665 00:36:19,160 --> 00:36:21,520 Speaker 4: Think? I think on the second question, there's definitely a 666 00:36:21,600 --> 00:36:24,520 Speaker 4: risk that the cost of leverage goes up. From a 667 00:36:24,560 --> 00:36:28,800 Speaker 4: systemic point of view, if banks are financing these trades, 668 00:36:28,920 --> 00:36:33,560 Speaker 4: and if that financing business gets charged more in risk capital, 669 00:36:33,960 --> 00:36:37,560 Speaker 4: then you would imagine that you know, the traction of 670 00:36:38,120 --> 00:36:42,120 Speaker 4: some of the pots become less attractive because if imagine 671 00:36:42,200 --> 00:36:45,560 Speaker 4: I have to fund my book at ten percent when 672 00:36:46,120 --> 00:36:49,080 Speaker 4: risk rere rates are five percent, then I'm less likely 673 00:36:49,200 --> 00:36:52,399 Speaker 4: to find any GOO opportunities, right, I mean, I'm still 674 00:36:52,400 --> 00:36:55,200 Speaker 4: going to find something, but not as much of these 675 00:36:55,640 --> 00:36:58,600 Speaker 4: R type stuff. But the other aspect of it is 676 00:36:58,640 --> 00:37:02,000 Speaker 4: like what they're really so I think, which is like 677 00:37:02,080 --> 00:37:05,279 Speaker 4: one of the positives of the multistrat funds is that 678 00:37:05,480 --> 00:37:08,080 Speaker 4: like unlike a fund of funds where you couldn't net 679 00:37:08,320 --> 00:37:12,239 Speaker 4: risks together, here you're able to net all this exposure. Right, 680 00:37:12,280 --> 00:37:15,400 Speaker 4: So imagine you have one person long of Tesla and 681 00:37:15,440 --> 00:37:18,319 Speaker 4: the other person short of Tesla. Now you as the 682 00:37:18,680 --> 00:37:22,360 Speaker 4: end investor, doesn't have to have these two positions and 683 00:37:22,560 --> 00:37:25,799 Speaker 4: two different hedge funds. They're all getting netted and you're 684 00:37:25,840 --> 00:37:30,840 Speaker 4: only getting charged for the net exposure cross margining, cross margining, 685 00:37:30,960 --> 00:37:33,520 Speaker 4: which has been a big challenge. So if you're a 686 00:37:33,640 --> 00:37:36,719 Speaker 4: single manager fund and let's say you're invested in like 687 00:37:36,800 --> 00:37:39,880 Speaker 4: ten different single manager funds, you know what if like 688 00:37:39,960 --> 00:37:42,200 Speaker 4: five of them along of Tesla and the other five 689 00:37:42,200 --> 00:37:45,480 Speaker 4: were short, Now your problem is you're on a net 690 00:37:45,520 --> 00:37:46,680 Speaker 4: basis kind of flat. 691 00:37:47,000 --> 00:37:48,360 Speaker 2: You're paying for everyone's leverage. 692 00:37:48,400 --> 00:37:50,640 Speaker 4: You're paid for everyone's leverage, and so that is like 693 00:37:50,680 --> 00:37:54,319 Speaker 4: a big advantage I think of having this sort of thing. 694 00:37:54,400 --> 00:37:57,080 Speaker 4: But on the flip side, right, if you think about it, 695 00:37:57,440 --> 00:38:01,920 Speaker 4: if imagine you have five pods, there are long of 696 00:38:01,960 --> 00:38:04,799 Speaker 4: Tesla and five pods that are short of Tesla, just 697 00:38:04,840 --> 00:38:08,359 Speaker 4: to take a simple example, and Tesla goes up. Now, 698 00:38:08,640 --> 00:38:12,359 Speaker 4: typical multi strategy investor takes all the netting risks. So 699 00:38:13,000 --> 00:38:16,520 Speaker 4: historically in edge fund, if you invested in edge fund 700 00:38:16,520 --> 00:38:18,440 Speaker 4: and the edge fund didn't make money, you didn't pay 701 00:38:18,480 --> 00:38:21,799 Speaker 4: any fees to the manager. But now with the pod 702 00:38:21,880 --> 00:38:25,399 Speaker 4: structure and the multi strategy platform, the people who made 703 00:38:25,440 --> 00:38:28,279 Speaker 4: the money are getting their payouts and then the ones 704 00:38:28,320 --> 00:38:31,640 Speaker 4: that lost money, now you're actually taking the losses. So 705 00:38:32,040 --> 00:38:35,680 Speaker 4: if you have too much dispersion, that's not necessarily good 706 00:38:37,400 --> 00:38:39,480 Speaker 4: from a overall perspective. 707 00:38:39,400 --> 00:38:43,000 Speaker 3: And what about the systemic aspects of all of this? So, yes, Okay, 708 00:38:43,120 --> 00:38:46,000 Speaker 3: there are some weird moves in the market, and maybe 709 00:38:46,000 --> 00:38:50,040 Speaker 3: there's more short termism and we're getting bigger reactions to 710 00:38:50,640 --> 00:38:54,080 Speaker 3: one off events or announcements. But is it an issue 711 00:38:54,120 --> 00:38:56,840 Speaker 3: that we should be worried about? Should regulators be thinking 712 00:38:56,840 --> 00:38:57,200 Speaker 3: about this? 713 00:38:57,960 --> 00:39:00,360 Speaker 4: Well, I think the issue is less to do with 714 00:39:00,600 --> 00:39:02,759 Speaker 4: the day to day stuff. It's more to do with 715 00:39:02,840 --> 00:39:05,879 Speaker 4: these events, right, So I think the risk becomes more 716 00:39:06,000 --> 00:39:09,399 Speaker 4: material when you go into any sort of event that 717 00:39:09,440 --> 00:39:13,320 Speaker 4: we're not thinking about, Like, for instance, let's say EMP 718 00:39:13,440 --> 00:39:16,839 Speaker 4: strike happens and all the great costs. Obviously we would 719 00:39:16,880 --> 00:39:19,640 Speaker 4: be thinking about other things at that point, But just 720 00:39:19,680 --> 00:39:22,440 Speaker 4: to make an example of something that we're not thinking about, 721 00:39:22,520 --> 00:39:26,400 Speaker 4: if that would happen, we could have big systemic unwinds 722 00:39:26,400 --> 00:39:29,799 Speaker 4: of positions just because of the way risk is managed. Right, 723 00:39:29,880 --> 00:39:32,400 Speaker 4: And this is just natural, Like if you have a 724 00:39:32,760 --> 00:39:35,600 Speaker 4: system where there's a lot of leverage and it's being 725 00:39:35,640 --> 00:39:38,600 Speaker 4: tightly risk managed, you know you're going to create these 726 00:39:38,640 --> 00:39:39,680 Speaker 4: unwinds over time. 727 00:39:40,160 --> 00:39:44,000 Speaker 2: I'm curious about the non systemic risks to the model, 728 00:39:44,080 --> 00:39:46,160 Speaker 2: and by that I mean like there have been a 729 00:39:46,160 --> 00:39:49,640 Speaker 2: lot of new hedge fund launches over the last several months. 730 00:39:49,640 --> 00:39:51,759 Speaker 2: I keep seeing headlines on the Bloomberg, many of them 731 00:39:51,840 --> 00:39:54,879 Speaker 2: with the multi strap model. I imagine many people at 732 00:39:55,000 --> 00:39:57,680 Speaker 2: multi strategy hedge funds want to be the guy on 733 00:39:57,760 --> 00:39:59,960 Speaker 2: top rather than the pod with the you know, always 734 00:40:00,040 --> 00:40:02,360 Speaker 2: having to worry about is their capital being pulled, so 735 00:40:02,440 --> 00:40:05,720 Speaker 2: they leave and start something new. The returns for several 736 00:40:05,719 --> 00:40:08,680 Speaker 2: of the existing ones are pretty extraordinary. Last year, I 737 00:40:08,760 --> 00:40:12,400 Speaker 2: think Citadel's the Wellington Fund, it was up over fifteen percent, 738 00:40:12,480 --> 00:40:17,160 Speaker 2: like really pretty solid year. Sitting aside systemic events is 739 00:40:17,200 --> 00:40:20,560 Speaker 2: the risk that's just like the strategy is no longer 740 00:40:20,600 --> 00:40:22,560 Speaker 2: as good the more people into it, because typically that's 741 00:40:22,640 --> 00:40:24,880 Speaker 2: how it is. You just think about with investing, various 742 00:40:24,920 --> 00:40:27,960 Speaker 2: quant strategies eventually don't work when everyone figures out the 743 00:40:28,000 --> 00:40:30,960 Speaker 2: abnormality or whatever. What do you think about, like the 744 00:40:31,080 --> 00:40:33,919 Speaker 2: long term prospects of good returns in this space as 745 00:40:34,040 --> 00:40:35,719 Speaker 2: more people try to do the same thing. 746 00:40:36,160 --> 00:40:37,759 Speaker 4: I think it's a great question. So I think that 747 00:40:38,040 --> 00:40:41,680 Speaker 4: smaller you are, the better your advantages, because you know, 748 00:40:41,880 --> 00:40:43,400 Speaker 4: if you go back to what I was saying before, 749 00:40:43,880 --> 00:40:46,319 Speaker 4: if you have a one hundred bie hundred long short 750 00:40:46,360 --> 00:40:49,239 Speaker 4: equity book, you could get out of it immediately. Right, 751 00:40:49,320 --> 00:40:52,839 Speaker 4: if you have a fairly large book, it's nearly impossible 752 00:40:53,040 --> 00:40:56,200 Speaker 4: to get out. There's no exit liquidity for the traits. Right, 753 00:40:56,400 --> 00:40:59,000 Speaker 4: So the size is a major factor in terms of 754 00:40:59,040 --> 00:41:02,280 Speaker 4: how they would perfer over time. Now, what does happen 755 00:41:02,400 --> 00:41:06,360 Speaker 4: is the larger funds tend to have better financing terms 756 00:41:06,400 --> 00:41:08,759 Speaker 4: because they've been around the longer, and so they've locked 757 00:41:08,840 --> 00:41:11,080 Speaker 4: up all the funding and you know, so there is 758 00:41:11,080 --> 00:41:14,960 Speaker 4: a definite benefit for the size. But from a forwardlooking 759 00:41:15,000 --> 00:41:18,080 Speaker 4: return basis, you're going to be much better served in 760 00:41:18,200 --> 00:41:21,120 Speaker 4: smaller multi strategy funds because the multi strategy as a 761 00:41:21,120 --> 00:41:23,759 Speaker 4: concept is not a bad idea, it's just that the 762 00:41:23,920 --> 00:41:27,960 Speaker 4: sizes become so big. And also, think about like how 763 00:41:28,280 --> 00:41:31,799 Speaker 4: these managers are moving around, Right, So imagine somebody had 764 00:41:31,840 --> 00:41:35,839 Speaker 4: a great alpha source some secret sauce, and they worked 765 00:41:35,840 --> 00:41:38,640 Speaker 4: at a fund and now their junior person moved to 766 00:41:38,719 --> 00:41:40,960 Speaker 4: the fund across the street and starts to do the 767 00:41:41,000 --> 00:41:44,480 Speaker 4: same thing. Now, essentially that's what's happening is most of 768 00:41:44,520 --> 00:41:47,759 Speaker 4: these strategies are the alpha is kind of decaying, right, 769 00:41:47,800 --> 00:41:51,440 Speaker 4: because you have all the migration of people. So you 770 00:41:51,840 --> 00:41:56,120 Speaker 4: might say you have fifty or forty multi strategy funds, 771 00:41:56,560 --> 00:42:00,000 Speaker 4: but they might all be doing something very similar, right, 772 00:42:00,440 --> 00:42:02,799 Speaker 4: And so that's I think is going to mean that 773 00:42:03,040 --> 00:42:07,040 Speaker 4: overall returns might not be as attractive as they have 774 00:42:07,120 --> 00:42:08,480 Speaker 4: been in the past. I mean, and some of the 775 00:42:08,719 --> 00:42:11,640 Speaker 4: multi strategy funds I mean spectacular, right, Like look at 776 00:42:11,680 --> 00:42:13,719 Speaker 4: Citadel that you mentioned, they've been phenomenal. 777 00:42:14,200 --> 00:42:15,959 Speaker 2: Millennium had year last year. 778 00:42:16,080 --> 00:42:18,000 Speaker 4: They've been great. I mean, so in the past they've 779 00:42:18,000 --> 00:42:21,080 Speaker 4: been phenomenal. But on a going forward basis, as this 780 00:42:21,280 --> 00:42:23,799 Speaker 4: thing gets bigger and bigger, you would imagine that the 781 00:42:23,840 --> 00:42:27,040 Speaker 4: alpha kind of comes down. You don't have as many people. 782 00:42:27,600 --> 00:42:30,840 Speaker 4: So if you take a typical multi strategy fund, the 783 00:42:30,880 --> 00:42:33,480 Speaker 4: person who starts out starts out with two three hundred 784 00:42:33,560 --> 00:42:36,359 Speaker 4: million to manage. So if you have a trillion two 785 00:42:36,640 --> 00:42:40,040 Speaker 4: of capital, you're going to need forty thousand different parts. 786 00:42:40,719 --> 00:42:43,240 Speaker 4: I mean, not every part is you know that size. 787 00:42:43,280 --> 00:42:45,239 Speaker 4: A lot of parts are much bigger. But you know, 788 00:42:45,480 --> 00:42:47,319 Speaker 4: you can just think about a number of people that 789 00:42:47,320 --> 00:42:51,279 Speaker 4: you're going to require and enough orthogonal strategies, and I 790 00:42:51,360 --> 00:42:54,960 Speaker 4: just don't think there's that many you know, orthogonal strategies 791 00:42:55,000 --> 00:42:55,719 Speaker 4: out there. 792 00:42:55,880 --> 00:42:59,200 Speaker 3: So this might be getting ahead of ourselves a little bit, 793 00:42:59,360 --> 00:43:02,880 Speaker 3: but we started out describing the evolution of hedge funds. 794 00:43:02,960 --> 00:43:05,040 Speaker 3: So going from the two and twenty model to fund 795 00:43:05,080 --> 00:43:08,239 Speaker 3: of funds and then multi strategy, what's next in the 796 00:43:08,280 --> 00:43:11,720 Speaker 3: evolution if there is a risk of overcrowding and alpha 797 00:43:11,719 --> 00:43:15,239 Speaker 3: decay as you just described, what's the next big thing 798 00:43:15,280 --> 00:43:15,840 Speaker 3: on the radar? 799 00:43:16,400 --> 00:43:18,879 Speaker 4: So I think that this will evolve. You know, it'll 800 00:43:18,880 --> 00:43:21,520 Speaker 4: take time obviously, because you know, you'll need a few 801 00:43:21,560 --> 00:43:25,720 Speaker 4: years of underperformance before people say like, oh, this doesn't work. 802 00:43:26,040 --> 00:43:28,799 Speaker 4: But in my mind, the two things I'm betting on 803 00:43:29,080 --> 00:43:32,640 Speaker 4: is one is obviously anything that takes advantage of this 804 00:43:32,760 --> 00:43:35,919 Speaker 4: sort of you know behavior right where you're being risk 805 00:43:36,000 --> 00:43:39,440 Speaker 4: managed and forced unwined positions. So if you can actually 806 00:43:39,480 --> 00:43:42,719 Speaker 4: have slightly longer term capital, you can actually be the 807 00:43:42,760 --> 00:43:45,759 Speaker 4: person going and buying the stuff when everybody has to sell, right, 808 00:43:45,800 --> 00:43:48,000 Speaker 4: So that's a bigger opportunity I think. And then the 809 00:43:48,040 --> 00:43:51,440 Speaker 4: other one is any sort of long term capital structure 810 00:43:51,640 --> 00:43:54,160 Speaker 4: like an ETF or any of that sort of stuff, 811 00:43:54,520 --> 00:43:57,759 Speaker 4: because what happens there is that an ETF investor is 812 00:43:57,800 --> 00:44:01,160 Speaker 4: not like looking at it every single I mean, although 813 00:44:01,160 --> 00:44:03,680 Speaker 4: some might be, but most of them are investing for 814 00:44:03,719 --> 00:44:06,000 Speaker 4: the long term, right, So if you could sort of 815 00:44:06,080 --> 00:44:08,200 Speaker 4: manage that sort of money, then you get the ability 816 00:44:08,239 --> 00:44:09,760 Speaker 4: to actually sit through all these things. 817 00:44:10,480 --> 00:44:13,120 Speaker 2: Christiana Kumar, Goose Hollow Capital, thank you so much for 818 00:44:13,160 --> 00:44:13,920 Speaker 2: coming on of love. 819 00:44:14,440 --> 00:44:15,239 Speaker 3: That was so good. 820 00:44:15,360 --> 00:44:17,359 Speaker 4: Thank you, Thanks Gus. 821 00:44:29,400 --> 00:44:32,520 Speaker 2: Tracy. I really enjoyed that conversation. There was a lot 822 00:44:32,560 --> 00:44:34,520 Speaker 2: in there that was interesting to me. I think where 823 00:44:34,560 --> 00:44:37,280 Speaker 2: I would start was actually maybe with that last answer, 824 00:44:37,320 --> 00:44:40,080 Speaker 2: where it sort of seems like, you know, the one 825 00:44:40,200 --> 00:44:44,239 Speaker 2: thing that a POD seemingly cannot do is just that 826 00:44:44,320 --> 00:44:47,480 Speaker 2: sort of like long by and whole philosophy, right, Like 827 00:44:47,560 --> 00:44:50,440 Speaker 2: that's the one sort of bread and butter investment strategy 828 00:44:50,440 --> 00:44:52,799 Speaker 2: that you probably can't do when you're being short term 829 00:44:52,840 --> 00:44:55,080 Speaker 2: managed like that. So in the end, like the sort 830 00:44:55,080 --> 00:44:57,640 Speaker 2: of benefits may accrue to those who can just and 831 00:44:57,680 --> 00:45:00,600 Speaker 2: it's like what every financial advisor says, like right by 832 00:45:00,600 --> 00:45:03,000 Speaker 2: the index and like stocks go up, go about the 833 00:45:03,000 --> 00:45:03,800 Speaker 2: rest of your life. 834 00:45:03,880 --> 00:45:07,440 Speaker 3: Yeah, absolutely, that really crystallized that point, the idea of 835 00:45:07,520 --> 00:45:11,200 Speaker 3: like it's the time horizon. Yeah, that is different here. 836 00:45:11,480 --> 00:45:14,239 Speaker 3: And also you know, the crowding behavior. I was sort 837 00:45:14,239 --> 00:45:17,080 Speaker 3: of thinking back, do you remember flows before pros? 838 00:45:17,239 --> 00:45:18,120 Speaker 2: Yeah, that's your life. 839 00:45:18,239 --> 00:45:21,279 Speaker 3: Yeah, So the idea there was that, Okay, in an 840 00:45:21,400 --> 00:45:24,919 Speaker 3: environment of low returns sort of post two thousand and eight, 841 00:45:25,040 --> 00:45:30,320 Speaker 3: that it's hard to find you know, genuine like outperformance, 842 00:45:30,320 --> 00:45:32,480 Speaker 3: and so the best thing to do is just follow 843 00:45:32,520 --> 00:45:35,279 Speaker 3: the crowd, and that's how you kind of eke out alpha. 844 00:45:35,360 --> 00:45:36,880 Speaker 3: And then I'm thinking about it in the context of 845 00:45:36,880 --> 00:45:39,360 Speaker 3: the multi strategy firms, and I'm kind of thinking, like, 846 00:45:39,840 --> 00:45:42,680 Speaker 3: maybe pros create flows. Now, maybe that's what the multi 847 00:45:42,680 --> 00:45:44,759 Speaker 3: strategy firms are doing, Like they're just going in and 848 00:45:44,760 --> 00:45:45,960 Speaker 3: out on a daily basis. 849 00:45:46,200 --> 00:45:48,440 Speaker 2: Yeah, it's exactly that. Like I knew that there was 850 00:45:48,560 --> 00:45:51,719 Speaker 2: a lot of trading volume that came from there, but 851 00:45:51,760 --> 00:45:54,600 Speaker 2: I don't think I like totally understood why they had 852 00:45:54,640 --> 00:45:56,960 Speaker 2: to trade. So yeah, like why not just you know, 853 00:45:57,040 --> 00:45:59,279 Speaker 2: invest in some text docs and they probably go up. 854 00:45:59,400 --> 00:46:01,160 Speaker 2: But if you think it was, like, no, you're really 855 00:46:01,200 --> 00:46:03,720 Speaker 2: like not being paid to just like take a long 856 00:46:03,800 --> 00:46:06,440 Speaker 2: term view or anything. Because the long term is for 857 00:46:06,480 --> 00:46:08,880 Speaker 2: the end investors. The long term is for the LPs 858 00:46:08,960 --> 00:46:12,520 Speaker 2: and everyone else. Like your job is short term performance, 859 00:46:12,520 --> 00:46:14,239 Speaker 2: and you sort of like diversify it that way, and 860 00:46:14,320 --> 00:46:16,480 Speaker 2: it benefits the long term. There's just a lot of 861 00:46:16,520 --> 00:46:20,080 Speaker 2: interesting things about there so much isolating aspects. There's also 862 00:46:20,120 --> 00:46:22,000 Speaker 2: you know, like it makes so much sense about like 863 00:46:22,160 --> 00:46:25,400 Speaker 2: the capital efficiency of pod shops versus the fund of funds, 864 00:46:25,400 --> 00:46:27,080 Speaker 2: which no one enjoy tell like all these things like 865 00:46:27,120 --> 00:46:28,360 Speaker 2: sort of make a lot of sense to me. 866 00:46:28,480 --> 00:46:28,640 Speaker 4: Now. 867 00:46:28,840 --> 00:46:31,040 Speaker 3: Yeah, the other thing I would call out is the 868 00:46:31,120 --> 00:46:34,720 Speaker 3: leverage point. And again this has been going on for 869 00:46:34,719 --> 00:46:37,040 Speaker 3: for sort of a long time. And again I would 870 00:46:37,040 --> 00:46:40,160 Speaker 3: call back to the lack of returns in the post 871 00:46:40,239 --> 00:46:42,520 Speaker 3: two thousand and eight environment. That's when we saw people 872 00:46:42,640 --> 00:46:45,640 Speaker 3: start to use a whole host of intro well not start, 873 00:46:46,280 --> 00:46:49,799 Speaker 3: but using a whole host of interesting derivatives and like 874 00:46:49,880 --> 00:46:53,200 Speaker 3: CDX index options to bet on corporate credit because you 875 00:46:53,239 --> 00:46:56,399 Speaker 3: had that general macro environment as well. Things are sort 876 00:46:56,440 --> 00:46:59,320 Speaker 3: of evolving now. But I take the point, Okay, leverage 877 00:46:59,360 --> 00:47:02,120 Speaker 3: is expensive, particularly if you're a bank, and that's part 878 00:47:02,120 --> 00:47:05,560 Speaker 3: of the reason we've seen it migrate in some respects 879 00:47:05,560 --> 00:47:08,720 Speaker 3: to multi strategy funds. But I am interested to see 880 00:47:09,200 --> 00:47:12,680 Speaker 3: if that kind of war, the regulatory war on leverage 881 00:47:13,040 --> 00:47:16,080 Speaker 3: starts to pick up, because we have seen again going 882 00:47:16,120 --> 00:47:18,839 Speaker 3: back to the basis trade and treasury futures. A lot 883 00:47:18,840 --> 00:47:22,160 Speaker 3: of noises about that, and so yeah, definitely something to 884 00:47:22,200 --> 00:47:22,719 Speaker 3: keep an eye on. 885 00:47:22,840 --> 00:47:26,280 Speaker 2: Yeah, there's a lot there also just that point about like, okay, 886 00:47:26,719 --> 00:47:28,440 Speaker 2: you know it used to be that the sort of 887 00:47:28,480 --> 00:47:31,640 Speaker 2: proprietary trader at the bank could take advantage of some 888 00:47:31,960 --> 00:47:35,279 Speaker 2: weird dislocation when an investor needs to sell some off 889 00:47:35,280 --> 00:47:37,920 Speaker 2: the run treasuries and there may be not be an 890 00:47:37,920 --> 00:47:39,880 Speaker 2: obvious buyer for at the moment and you like pocket 891 00:47:39,960 --> 00:47:42,040 Speaker 2: a little bit of money. Yeah, and how okay. 892 00:47:41,840 --> 00:47:44,320 Speaker 3: That that balance sheet that was available. 893 00:47:44,080 --> 00:47:46,520 Speaker 2: Yeah, for those types of trades, and how that creates 894 00:47:46,520 --> 00:47:49,440 Speaker 2: opportunities for these funds and the specialists in these areas 895 00:47:49,440 --> 00:47:51,880 Speaker 2: to identify the as any really interesting conversation. 896 00:47:52,200 --> 00:47:54,120 Speaker 3: So much and there shall we leave it there for now. 897 00:47:54,200 --> 00:47:54,919 Speaker 2: Let's leave it there. 898 00:47:55,000 --> 00:47:55,360 Speaker 4: Okay. 899 00:47:55,560 --> 00:47:58,400 Speaker 3: This has been another episode of the All Thoughts podcast. 900 00:47:58,480 --> 00:48:01,160 Speaker 3: I'm Tracy Alloway. You can follow me at Tracy. 901 00:48:00,840 --> 00:48:03,719 Speaker 2: Alloway and I'm Jill Wisenthal. You can follow me at 902 00:48:03,719 --> 00:48:07,240 Speaker 2: the Stalwart. Follow our producers Kerman Rodriguez at Kerman Ermann, 903 00:48:07,320 --> 00:48:11,279 Speaker 2: Dashel Bennett at Dashbod Kilbrooks at Keilbrooks and Thank you 904 00:48:11,320 --> 00:48:14,320 Speaker 2: to our producer Moses On. For more Oddlots content, go 905 00:48:14,360 --> 00:48:17,239 Speaker 2: to bloomberg dot com slash odd Lots. We have transcripts, 906 00:48:17,280 --> 00:48:19,640 Speaker 2: a blog, and a newsletter and you can chat about 907 00:48:19,680 --> 00:48:22,280 Speaker 2: all of these topics with fellow listeners in the discord 908 00:48:22,320 --> 00:48:24,279 Speaker 2: twenty four to seven, one of my favorite places on 909 00:48:24,320 --> 00:48:28,000 Speaker 2: the Internet to hang out. 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